


anatomy of a feather

by norio



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Blood and Injury, Emotional Manipulation, M/M, Wingfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-04
Updated: 2016-09-04
Packaged: 2018-08-13 00:07:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7954369
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/norio/pseuds/norio
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For as long as he could remember, Akaashi had always seen the invisible wings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	anatomy of a feather

Akaashi had always seen the wings. 

Most people possessed wings, visible only to Akaashi. His own, barred in brown and white, spanned a few centimeters higher than his head. A passing neighbor would spread his sea blue feathers. A splash of cardinal red would flutter by the cucumbers. His middle school teacher possessed six short brown wings. They became no more than uninteresting appendages, as if someone showed him the fleshy inside of their forearm. 

Since he was young, he had known the wings were otherworldly. His small fingers would pass through his mother’s bespeckled wings and his own wings barely cast a shadow. So he kept the wings a mundane secret, the same way others kept eggs in a refrigerator. He suspected that if he ever spoke about his so-called ability, either an MRI machine would be heralded or he’d be reduced to a cheap parlor trick. 

Bokuto Koutarou had mottled tawny wings, black and golden bars running over the feathers. They stretched out to double his arm’s length. According to Akaashi’s anecdotal data, Bokuto’s wings were slightly larger than average. The owner of the wings was equally uninteresting, a second-year with a loud voice. The flock of second-years preened their plumages while the first-years’ wings twitched and rustled.

Akaashi was more interested in volleyball than ornithology. He had joined Fukurodani Academy because their volleyball team played on the Nationals level. Even the second-years showed incredible skill. 

His fingers itched to set the ball to them. 

While they rotated courts for their three-on-threes, Akaashi squeezed his plastic water bottle and observed. Komi, with his strong tufted wings, was a good libero. Konoha, whose long and silvery wings draped through the court floor, played all positions. Saru, with the brown and white radiating pattern, spiked well. Washio, the almost bluish tinge to his feathers, blocked another attempt. Akaashi could imagine a champion team. 

When the setter on the court tossed the ball to Bokuto, Akaashi barely watched. He sipped at the plastic nozzle, cool water puddling in his mouth. Long kneepads, he thought absently. He himself found kneepads constricting. 

But when Bokuto ran for the ball, his wings cascaded out behind him. 

Wings couldn’t be controlled. Akaashi had never consciously moved his own wings, though wings could instinctually respond to emotions. Shaking for nervousness, curling in protection. But watching from the bench, he truly believed Bokuto had complete control over his wings. They pushed off the ground and unfurled, the light from the high gym windows piercing through the veil of feathers. That was another thing, humans couldn’t fly. But Bokuto flew, and his palm connected hard against the ball. The player on the other side toppled over, unable to receive the ball, which rebounded hard off the wall. Good wings. Good spike. Good player. Nationals was no longer a maybe. 

Akaashi thought, with a shiver, that he could use this. 

He could use—him.

\--

But Bokuto Koutarou was temperamental, an uncommitted torrent of personality. On Monday, an empty vending machine sent him into a spasm of pain. On Tuesday, a failed quiz brought a shrug. He begged notebooks from Shirofuku and her white wings, and left their pale blue covers sticking up for days from his forgotten bag. 

His only saving grace was that he could, occasionally, play well in volleyball. When he spiked the ball, Akaashi could believe he was watching the scene on national television. Bokuto could run and hit and fly, some incredible balance between his muscles and his mind. On other days, Akaashi was reminded of a preschool, while Bokuto dug through his nose in heated competition. He alternated between useful and useless with alarming alacrity. 

“We don’t know what’s wrong with him today,” Konoha said, resting his elbows on the ball cart. “We philistines don’t get his mind.”

“What kinda word is that? Philstine,” Komi said.

“You’re saying it wrong, it’s phil-uh-steene.” 

“Phils-tine.” 

Bokuto huddled in the corner of the gym, arms wrapped around his knees. His unfocused eyes narrowed to the opposite wall. His large wings ruffled behind him, flattened against his back into twin lean lines. Hungry. Bokuto was hungry. This was silly, and Akaashi wanted to start practice without the petty pandering. He dug through his bag, cotton towel folding over his hand. The protein bar, forgotten trash, had rested at the bottom of his bag for a week. He approached Bokuto.

“Hey, say anemone,” Konoha was saying.

“What?”

“Anemone. Say it.”

“I’m not saying it!” 

Akaashi extended the protein bar warily. Bokuto accepted the food into his hands, vague look melting into a sharper recognition. His wings fluffed outwards, expanding into—happiness, perhaps. On closer inspection, the feathers had a lighter amber tinge, a lined pattern scoring the vanes. When the wings spread out, the light scattered through the large primary feathers. 

“Akaashi,” Bokuto said pleasurably, strong fingers grasping the plastic. His eyes sparked with adoration. Behind Akaashi, the team still argued. 

“Ane… anemoneone… shut up! You got a weird laugh!” 

“Sorry, sorry! But you really bit off more than you could chew.” 

\--

Akaashi tried to keep Bokuto’s wings in the Goldilocks Zone, the astronomical term only comparable in the cosmic catastrophe that was Bokuto Koutarou. Riled up, the wings would bristle and restlessly sway. Too depressed, the wings would pull in close to his back, tight and sleek. Akaashi jotted his observations in a notebook.

He just wanted to play volleyball. 

“Weren’t you the one who got lost on his first day,” he would say, and the puffed wings would flatten down again, Bokuto’s spikes landing within the lines. 

“Yes, I saw. It was good,” strengthened his arms, limp receives turned to salvageable balls, amber wings livened to a facet of gold. 

If Bokuto said, “Stay longer, Akaashi!” then Akaashi would calculate the amount of his homework, his current grades, the benefits of which practice, his immediate volleyball goals, the dietary needs and consumption rate, and the state of Bokuto’s wings before he reluctantly agreed. Carrots, he would think while examining the dull sheen of the feathers, or yogurt. Low-fat milk. Plain bread. 

Tending to Bokuto took time and thought, but he had been raised in a house with clean white walls, feet tucked underneath his body, words spoken with unannounced meaning. This was a Nationals level wing spiker. He would do much more for much less. 

So when Bokuto said, “Help me stretch,” Akaashi reluctantly ambled across the empty court. His sweaty shirt clutched to his skin. His white jacket had been folded on a bench. Bokuto’s jacket sprawled somewhere on an adjacent court. He suppressed a sigh.

“I want a really deep stretch,” Bokuto said, fingers clutching the tips of his shoes. He bent forward, wings rustling in anticipation. Akaashi leaned downwards, hands flat to shove him deeper into the floor. 

But his fingers met feathers first. 

The wings couldn’t be touched. That was a rule. Akaashi could never touch his parents’ wings or his own, hand always penetrating through the quills just as the wings always passed through walls. Yet his fingers buried deep into the feathers, knuckles emerging from the coverts. He clenched down on the plumes, not believing what he was touching. 

“Hurry up, Akaashi!” Bokuto wiggled beneath him, oblivious. Akaashi numbly shoved his knee onto Bokuto’s back, the carelessness unlike him. The feathers of the wings brushed against his bare thigh. Bokuto bent forward, humming happily to stretch beyond his shoes. 

They shouldn’t have been so soft from what Akaashi gleaned about barbs and hooklets. But his hands slid over the comfortable feathers, tracing down the trickling vanes. They were warm, like jogging in the sun and entering a cool room with that warmth still radiating inside him. If he pressed his fingers inwards, he could feel the strong bony structure. He ran his fingers over the curve of the wing, the dip of the feathers, slipping his finger over a thick quill. Something good and strong poured into him, with a hint of danger electrifying through his fingers. But the overwhelming good stayed on his fingers, like a purifying force and a familiar friend. 

“Akaashi?” Bokuto had twisted his head around, still bent into the stretch. Akaashi hastily released him, the warmth still throbbing in his hands. 

They changed in the club room. Bokuto shucked off his shirt, inhaling deeply after the collar pulled over his head. His worn shirt easily passed through the wings, but Akaashi’s knuckles brushed over the feathers when he inched to his locker. He squeezed his hands together to preserve the good warmth in the lines of his palm. 

“I’m going to be captain next year,” Bokuto said. His wings ruffled with pride, shirt still hanging from his hand. The dim light cast shadows over his abs. 

“Oh,” Akaashi said, the only utterance he could spit out in the event of the life-changing wing revelation. He tried to touch his own and grasped air. 

“Did you want to be vice-captain?” 

“I suppose,” Akaashi said absently, brushing his fingers over Bokuto’s notched feathers. Bokuto didn’t react, only buttoning up his shirt. 

“I said, I told them, you’d be a good vice-captain. It’ll be a lot of work, but I’ll help you.” Bokuto beamed. It was the other way around, Akaashi thought distantly. He stepped out of the club room, meeting the cold night air. Behind him, Bokuto locked the door, plastic keychain knocking against the plaster. 

The snow had been cleared from the campus walkway, shoved atop bushes and frozen shards of grass. A white truck rumbled down the narrow road and street lamps illuminated the squat apartments with their wooden-framed windows. Akaashi missed the warmth from the wings. He tried to compare the feeling to a home-cooked meal, still steaming from the oven. No, the satisfaction from running up a hill, wiping the sweat with his shirt and gazing down at the potted plants wedged between brick buildings. No, they were not enough to describe the goodness flowing into his arms. It was tantalizingly familiar, but he could not place the feeling.

“Are you cold?” Bokuto said suddenly. “It’s okay if you’re cold.” 

“I’m not cold,” Akaashi said, detached, trying to remember the adoring warmth in his hands. 

\--

He managed Bokuto in a series of elaborate levers and pulleys, guided by the stricken tension of the wings. Bokuto forgot plays on the court, or he obsessed over a certain move, or he wanted to practice for too long. Akaashi played the long game, pretending he didn’t know Bokuto was listening while he pondered about the new store down the street, how it’d be nice if someone went with him. The wings would always twitch with excitement, wing span sprawling out while Bokuto feigned indecision. It was easy and convenient. 

“I want a snack,” Bokuto announced, swiveling towards the cozy display of cakes in the station kiosk. Red strawberries dotted fresh cream, swirls of chocolate nestled between glistening yellow mangos. But Akaashi wanted to go home and he refused to miss his train. Bokuto’s wings slid against each other. Not hunger, only want. 

“I thought you said you’d eat healthier,” Akaashi said. The wings stopped. 

“Um,” Bokuto said, hanging his head guiltily. “Yeah, no. Yeah. I’m not hungry.”

Akaashi slid his rail pass over the gate. Bokuto trailed in his footsteps, wings tucked behind him. The station crowd had thinned, though clusters of students and working adults in stiff collars meandered around the walls. Posters of happy children grinned behind the thick glass. The silver wires spread over the sky, tenuously wrapped around metal poles. A faint acrid metal scent lingered in the air. 

“Akaashi,” Bokuto said, hands stuffed in his jacket pockets. “Is there anyone you like?” 

“What?” Akaashi calculated the day’s energy expenditures, figurative numbers crunching down to protein shakes and muscle tendons. “Sleep early tonight.” 

“Yeah. Yeah, okay.” Bokuto frowned vaguely, wings shifting in the wind. He seemed upset. Bokuto was alarmingly simple, but sometimes, complicated. Akaashi wrapped his fingers around the tip of his wing, stroking the warm feathers into the same direction. Though he never discerned a difference in Bokuto’s behavior, he could pretend it gave him some comfort. The intoxicating good feeling ran up his arm and settled into his chest, fluttering around until it wrapped around his heart. Like a hot soup, like a big hug, like the ridges of a volleyball, and nothing like that. 

The train rumbled to a stop. Bokuto’s train, but not Akaashi’s. He stayed behind the bumpy yellow line, still absently stroking the feather with his thumb, and Bokuto stepped into the train. He should study that night, and review the footage for the teams that last played in Nationals. He had to research into the best practice drills for next week, and prepare for the upcoming exams. For the next week, he should monitor Bokuto’s food intake levels and sleeping patterns more closely. 

“Akaashi,” Bokuto said. “See you tomorrow.” He smiled and raised his hand in farewell. 

Akaashi held up his left hand halfway to his chest. His right hand was holding something. He looked down. The train doors slammed shut. The wing was still in his hand. He tried to release it—hastily—but the wing tore—like wet paper—

The blood splashed up his school uniform and into his mouth. He dropped the half-wing, stepping back from the yellow line. The blood was red, which made sense, in some sick way. The edges of the feathers stained with blood, which pooled and dripped off the station. 

“Wait,” Akaashi said, but his voice couldn’t be heard over the rumbling of the train.

One step, two, and then he was pushing past the crowd until he reached a pillar and his palm pressed flat against the cool tiles. He covered his mouth with his hand. The blood trickled between his teeth, traitorous warmth still in his hand. 

Phone. His phone. He shoved his hands into his bag. A railway attendant studied him for a second too long, his dark green wings sweeping the floor. Going through the floor. Akaashi found his phone with sweaty palms, mistyping his password twice. He scrolled to the chat, typing with numb and cold fingers. His stomach felt sour, like dropping ice into spoiled milk. 

「 Bokuto-san. 」One second. Two. Bokuto responded faster than that. Akaashi ran his fingers through his hair, sticky blood coagulating on his fingers. Wings weren’t real. Wings were simply a figment of his imagination, a mischievous floater in his eye. His hands sweated. His phone buzzed and he almost dropped it, cupping it like precious water in his hands.

「 ? 」was Bokuto’s response.

Bokuto was fine. Everything was fine. Nothing was wrong. Wings didn’t exist, not if he couldn’t touch them with his hands. But the wings from the pedestrians taunted him, unfurling in resplendent patterns. He tucked his phone into his bag, but his legs shook. He stumbled to a bench, sliding over the cool metal. When he closed his eyes to blink, the afterimage of the abandoned half-wing stuck to his mind.

From where he sat, he could still see the desserts store, flush with a glowing light. The fruits and chocolate sparkled like jewels, forbidden and trapped behind the solid glass and the metal gate. 

\--

Akaashi sat with his hands curved over his knees, gripped like claws. The students passed through the courtyard, mouths muffled in collars and hands wrapped in safety mittens. They blended together into a gray river, trickling into the front building. When he saw Bokuto emerge through the gates, Akaashi tried to stand up. His legs wiggled underneath him. 

One wing had cleanly snapped in half, its warm gold now covered in dried blood. Under the cold sunlight, a shimmer of intoxicating red dripped from the broken edge. The other wing had lost clumps of feathers, primaries and secondaries, drooping into a plainer gray. Akaashi could remember the former pillowing light underneath the wings, the confident stroke of ink along the outer rim. Now another glob of feathers dripped onto the grass. 

“Akaashi, hey!” Bokuto waved. “What’re you doing here?” 

“I attend this school.” 

“Oh. Yeah.” Bokuto grinned, but his eyes darted towards the solemn building. “Did I do something wrong?”

“What?” Akaashi touched the better wing with two fingers, hoping to find a magical switch. The warmth eased into his fingers, feathers brushing with fragility over his knuckles. A long feather tumbled to the ground, quill darkened with rot. 

“No, nothing! Nothing. Never seen you wait for me.” Bokuto shrugged, the wings rising with his shoulders. The broken wing twitched in pain, trying to fold itself against his back. The better wing barely reacted, ashy vanes swinging in the wind. Akaashi couldn’t tell if Bokuto was lying or telling the truth, and he felt an undercurrent of laughter rising in his throat, because it didn’t matter. He had instinctually glanced towards the wings, and they whispered about pain. 

“To be honest, I couldn’t sleep last night,” Bokuto mumbled miserably. He tilted his head up towards the face of the clock. Akaashi could see the restless tiredness in his visage, running with bottled energy. 

When Akaashi sat down in homeroom, he couldn’t recollect if he had finished his math homework. The school bells chimed, notes descending and ascending. He had a shuddering memory of last night where he stared at his desk, cold hands splayed against blank paper. 

\--

Bokuto’s vertical jump height remained the same. He spiked and laughed, clapping his friends on the back. Akaashi scribbled down the numbers, trying to find correlation or causation. His head weighed like rocks. His pencil skittered wild over the thin lines. Bokuto’s numbers seemed normal, but the feeling of wrongness simmered in his knotted stomach. When Bokuto landed after a spike, his injured wing would tremble and hide into his shoulder blade. Few remaining feathers clutched onto the spindly bones. 

“Should I get orange or apple juice?” Bokuto asked, plopping onto the bench and rocking the wood on the metal screws. Akaashi flipped to another page of his notebook. He needed to meet with the advisor in an hour to discuss academic standings. The budget meeting was next week. Studying, too, he would need to study for his exams, and last night’s miserable attempt at homework had done him no favors. 

“Akaashi?” Bokuto ducked his head, towel hanging from his neck. 

“What?” Akaashi said, and then, “Choose whatever you’d like.” 

“Yeah, but which one’s the right one?” 

“Whichever you’d like,” Akaashi said. He considered asking for an increase for their budget, and didn’t look at the skeletal wing, which shivered in tiny swaying gasps. The plumes of other students taunted him. If he focused on a pinprick of his mind, their wings would turn a shimmery transparent. But Bokuto’s wings remained, even if he concentrated enough to fatigue his mind. 

He hadn’t expected something so intangible to be so fragile. 

“So,” Bokuto said, rubbing the back of his neck. “Which one’s better to you?” 

“It doesn’t matter,” Akaashi said, irritated at being dredged from the mire of his misery. 

“No, it doesn’t, yeah,” Bokuto said, fingers spread out, “but, I always choose wrong, but you choose right, so I just wanted to know.” 

“There’s no wrong option,” Akaashi said. Bokuto gnawed on his lower lip. If Bokuto’s wing had been whole, Akaashi would have easily read the lines of his emotions and responded with the right layered words. But the wing only shuddered in pain, phantom convulsions from an ethereal plane. 

“Maybe,” Bokuto said, “I’ll get water.” He had an unusual thinness to his voice, a quiet uncertainty forming an iridescent bubble around them. And maybe the numbers Akaashi had recorded had nothing to do with the wings. He should have been counting the number of times Bokuto had smiled since the morning, if he had chosen his favorite food for lunch, how long he had spun his pencil around his fingers. Something was wrong, but not in wiry sinews and firm tendons. Something deeper, inside, and Akaashi swallowed the hard memory of the train station.

At the silence, Bokuto trotted off down the court. A few first-years flagged him down, and Bokuto grew enamored with teaching them the downswing of his arm, distracted from his vending machine mission.

It wasn’t the wing that bothered Akaashi. It was the other wing, the one he hadn’t torn in half, because he had never seen a wing so decayed, like a knife whittling into rock. Feathers trailed behind Bokuto like broken shavings of stone. He could only assume the injured wing was gangrenous, putrid and rotting from the inside, and had infected the other wing.

Maybe wings were webs of pain, and Akaashi would do him a favor by yanking out its roots. The other wing would unfurl, relieved at the abandonment, and new growth would bloom. But he could still recall the echoing warmth of the wing, something kind and innocent curling between his fingers, and knew he was telling lies to himself. Yet only he could touch Bokuto’s wings. Only he could help him. Only he could hurt him. 

On the other side of the net, Bokuto caught his eye. Akaashi could not read whether he was happy or unhappy. No bunched up feathers, no playful flicks, no tightened wing. Akaashi could no longer understand him. Bokuto waved. Akaashi clenched his fingers over his notebook and pretended to only be watching the first-years, who sprang up against the net and mimicked the spikes before crashing back to the ground. 

\--

Akaashi liked being the setter. 

The whistle blew and the ball leapt into motion, and he, too, chased the ball with squeaking shoes and a pivot turn, poised and ready to touch his fingers to the ball. Three seconds, two, and he had to find the best route to the best player, maybe a quick, the blockers gathered on one side, the formation on their own side. Fukurodani was an offensive school. He liked that. They always had their eyes on the ball, wings sleek and flapping. A receive sent the ball spiraling outwards and he lunged to still set it, at a good angle and a good speed, the perfect height for the perfect hit. He liked being the setter. 

Bokuto stormed off the court, shoving his way into the storage room. The practice lulled, though an idle conversation picked up across the net. That TV show, last night, did you see it. The one with the big fake sword, wasn’t that funny. Wasn’t that cool. 

“Going after him?” Konoha asked, wiping his sweat with a towel. Komi had slid face-first onto the bench, and Washio had already turned for the beckoning vending machine. The team had a knack for turning Bokuto’s moods into impromptu breaks. But if Bokuto still had his wings, then Akaashi would have known the answer. A furious wing meant they could safely ignore him. A twitching wing meant he needed someone to follow him. 

“I’ll go,” Akaashi said, because he was tired and he had homework. The meeting had been tiring and he had only taken a page of notes for the day. He would finish this tonight. 

The storage room had a distinct coolness, like ice cubes melting underneath his tongue. The small room had grown crowded, neatness a sheepish malingerer. A rectangular window cut along the side, daylight catching the rising specks of dust. Bokuto sat in the corner, knees curled to his chest. The offending wing fluttered back and forth, throbbing like an errant heartbeat. 

“Bokuto-san.” Akaashi wiped his hand on his shorts. He still carried the heat of the game in his sweat and fingers. 

“I’m not going back out and you can’t make me, Akaashi,” Bokuto mumbled into his arm. Which was a silly thing to say, because Akaashi always had his ways. But now he groped around in the fading light, the wings no longer leading his path. 

“I thought you wanted to practice your spikes. You missed three in the last game.” Meetings, and papers, and homework, and notes, and classes, and tearing out Bokuto’s remaining wing. For his sake, Akaashi reminded himself, keeping his footsteps soft. His hand swung like a pendulum by his hip.

“This is why you’re only in the top five aces of the nation,” he said, prodding. “Please consider the impact of your actions. The others won’t be able to practice until their captain returns. We’d need to apologize to other schools if you did this during the training camps.” 

The wing didn’t move. He couldn’t tell if his way was working yet. His hand stilled over the broken wing, fingers centimeters away from clenching the bone. He wondered if he would have to steady himself to truly pull it out by the roots, if he would have to slam his hand onto Bokuto’s back and thrust him onto the mats. But he still felt sick from the train station, fearful of the easy destruction. He’d been distracted that day, mind filled with duties. Everyone expected for him to bring Bokuto back out again. 

“It’s difficult for us to put up with your behavior when you’re like this.” Akaashi thumbed the edge of a feather, trying to summon up the courage to grab and pull. 

No answer or response. But once Akaashi pulled the wing, the other might flourish. This was for Bokuto’s sake. He tried to shake off the strange ache in his chest, ebbing into his throat while his hand clenched around the cold bone and flaky dried blood. 

“It’d be easier,” he murmured, “if you were different.” 

Bokuto stood up. Akaashi released his hold on the wing before he remembered his plan, his role. He latched onto Bokuto’s arm, twisting him to better angle the injured wing. He had to pluck the wing. This was his chance. 

But the thin light from the window fell on Bokuto’s contorted face. He had clamped down his teeth over his bottom lip, face a strange blotchy red. His eyebrows kneaded together and his jaw was gripped tight. He turned away towards the shadows, but Akaashi had already seen something wet and glimmering in the corners of his eyes. 

Bokuto yanked his arm away, fast enough to leave a faint scratch over his arm. His wing shuddered, a deep tremor where the feathers slipped off and disintegrated into a fine mist of dust. A few fluttered and slapped Akaashi on the chest and arms, and he could feel that warm feeling for a moment, a second. 

It was the illumination of their faces underneath the street lamp while Bokuto split the meat bun between them, the hot steam erupting out like smoke. A careless brush of fingers together, knuckles tumbling over wrists. An errant arm slung over shoulders, drawn together by the heated crook of the elbow.

Affection, he thought. The good feeling had been affection. 

Bokuto left the room and the feathers turned to dust.

Akaashi stood alone in the storage room. The ashes had already begun to vanish off the floor. He was a puppeteer, but the strings had wrapped around his fingers and squeezed them blue to the tips. He’d been wrong about something, everything, and his heart pounded in his chest because he had become the reason why there was right or wrong answers between apples and oranges, the fearful insistence in Bokuto’s voice. 

This isn’t your fault, an ugly voice said inside him, rippling and tearing beside his ear. But it was his fault, wasn’t it. Standing in the cold storage room, he couldn’t recall a single act of genuine kindness that he had committed. No, the ugly voice said, but weren’t you right, didn’t he need you. Yes, that’s right, but he wasn’t the one who had made that hurt face, hadn’t had his trust betrayed. 

The ugly voice slipped into silence. He missed its presence. 

He dared not sit down, even if his mind spun in whirlwind cycles. If his knees touched something so cold like the wooden floor, he would not be able to bear it. Instead, he fought off the guilty ebb around his aching heart, his sinking stomach, his empty hands. He could recall Bokuto’s wings, which, upon reflection, had been lovely in the way a sunrise was nice, like nothing could encompass them. After he had set the ball in a nice, high arch, he’d watch the flickering gilted edge of the feathers, the mesmerizing pattern, the light caught in between the fringes. Bokuto would land safely within the regulated lines, like he should be that protected. 

Akaashi breathed in a dull hiss. 

He pushed open the door. The strong gym lights hurt his eyes. The team slowed in their practice, heads swiveling to find him. Their stares were needles of guilt. He tried to apologize, but he averted his eyes to the glazed straight lines.

Sarukai clapped a hand on his shoulder. 

“Let’s get back to practice,” he said, steering Akaashi towards the court. Konoha smiled encouragingly, lobbing the ball underhand at him. Akaashi caught the ball at chest-level, hands gripped tight against the sides. 

They played volleyball. The receives spiraled towards him, he set the ball, someone would spike. They did not withhold their serves or passes, and Akaashi continued the game. With his breathing so fast and rapid, he could almost forget the incident, if not for the flatter mood. A cocoon of tension still wrapped around the gym, informing every play. Not blame, he thought, but a sort of lulling patience. 

Half an hour later, the gym door drew open in a small crack. 

Coarse tissue paper snarled around Bokuto’s hands, wrapping around his knuckles. From behind the net, Akaashi found that absurd. There were softer things than that. But Bokuto also had red, puffy eyes, and he raised his wrist to his nose several times. 

“Is practice over?” Bokuto sounded irritated. But Konoha shrugged, the pressure rolling off his agile shoulders. 

“Actually, some of us can stay longer tonight. Do you want that?” 

“Yeah!” Bokuto brightened up immediately, a warbling grin making its way across his face. Someone rustled his hair, another patted his back. Akaashi turned to gather his things, nestling his water bottle in his elbow while he grabbed his jacket. 

“You’re staying too, right?” Somehow, Bokuto now stood behind him. Akaashi thumbed his water bottle nozzle. 

“If you’d like,” Akaashi said evenly. 

“Yeah! Stay.” Bokuto turned away with a lighter bounce in his step. Akaashi stared at the faint shadow of his own wings, which he hoped were leaner or more ragged or more destroyed, anything for his outside to look more like his insides. But they were normal, and he felt betrayed. 

When he concentrated on volleyball, it was easier. His mind was occupied on the immediate tosses. He did not linger and ponder on why they were treating him the same, all of them, in some cruelness of kindness. He knew they knew what he had done, in some sense, and he knew they knew he knew he had somehow belied their confidence. But the ball was lobbied towards him and he set the ball and Bokuto hit the ball, and it made a sort of dire sense. 

One match at a time, the others trickled away. They were reluctant to leave them alone, hesitant in their sweeping gazes, but something must have given them confidence because they did leave and it was only Bokuto and Akaashi on the court. Bokuto was drinking his water, holding his bottle with both hands. Both his ragged wings had withered to bony arches, feathers flopping off with their own unhappy comedic timing. 

Akaashi sat on a bench. 

“Bokuto-san,” he said. “I’m sorry.” His apologies for the event. His sincere regrets for the occurrence. His submission for an act of contrition. So on, so forth. 

“I’m not mad,” Bokuto said crabbily. “But you’re not even sorry about the right thing.” 

Akaashi didn’t expect his apology to go over easy, but he didn’t expect it to be so difficult. He rubbed his hands together slowly, hand curving over his wrist like he was holding himself. Bokuto stood in front of him with his scuffed shoes, the kneepads down to his shins.

“What’s the right thing?” Akaashi asked softly. Bokuto scuffed his shoes against the court, the toe nosing against the laminate. 

“I don’t know. It’s just—I don’t know, you know, we both know that you meant it. What you said.” 

“That’s not true.” 

“You meant it when you said it. And it hurt, Akaashi. I’m not mad, but it really hurt. Especially since it was you.” 

The last of the shattered bone and feathers fell to the ground, collapsing inwardly into a cloud of matted dust. No more shadows remained from Bokuto’s back. His wings were shed and lost. This was the strange warmth Akaashi had felt, heads bent together in a whispered secret, now gone. Akaashi tightened his grip on his wrist. He thought it would be more reverent to destroy something beautiful.

“Hey, you know. Since I was a kid, I’ve had this special ability. I’ve never told anyone about it, but it’s like I can… sense things, you know?” Bokuto stepped forward and Akaashi tried to wet his dry mouth, heart pounding in his squeezed chest. 

“That’s how I know that everybody I like is a good person.” Bokuto’s fingers reached out, grazing Akaashi’s cheek and curling over his ear. “I think, maybe, you’ve got a lot of things to do. I don’t know, you always seem busy and thinking. And maybe you’ve been thinking it’s easier to make people do what you want. I don’t know.” 

Akaashi could feel the strange warmth again, the familiar goodness, flowing into him. He bit back a surprised inhale. Bokuto’s fingers were rough and wide. He touched Akaashi with delicacy unlike him, trailing over his cheeks and ghosting around the tips of his ears. His fingers tangled into Akaashi’s hair and he gently pressed underneath his chin to tilt upwards. Akaashi allowed himself to be persuaded, following the push. He never thought he’d feel the warm sensation again, and his heart quickened at the relief. His shoulders loosened. Something resolutely strong and firm was pouring into him, filling him up whole. 

“But people aren’t like that. In volleyball, anyway, you have to rely on your team and stuff like that. Trust them. Talk to them. I don’t know. But I know that you’re a setter, Akaashi. So if something’s too heavy on your back, just pass it to me. I’ll take it.” 

Something was unfurling on Bokuto’s back. Akaashi watched, keeping his face painfully still, at the glowing tips of the emerging wings. They were bright, brighter than he could recall seeing on any wings. Light had been carefully borne onto every vane, beaming from downy feathers. The old markings surfaced, promising the calm of night while it whispered into curved lines. The wings grew and grew, the tips piercing the poles, the nets, the carts of balls, until it brushed through the entire width of the gym. Akaashi had never seen wings so wide, and none that inspired such strange peace. They were a familiar warm gold. 

He thought a wrong had been righted, but all he’d done was sit down. His heart pounded on the walls of his chest, hummingbird quick. 

“Well, that’s what I think! You can think what you want.” Bokuto’s fingers hesitated. “Oh, but, you’re always looking behind me, Akaashi. It’d be nice if you looked at me, too, sometimes.” 

Akaashi traced down the enormous wings, following the smooth curves. He found it hard to remove himself from something so big and bright and filled him with so much, but the feathers rustled like a secret and he trailed over the mountainous arch. Wings, then shirt, then face, and then he was looking at Bokuto. Bokuto had a sharp face, open eyes. He was smugly grinning, beam stretched wide across his face. It was a pleasant smile. It unknotted something inside Akaashi’s stomach and he breathed shallowly. It was the hands in his hair, the wings on his back, the gentle smile in front of him, that overlapped like a mansion of cards and he was pushed from the verge of something into something bigger, better. He half-expected to look down at his feet and see only sky beneath him, but he couldn’t look away. Bokuto had familiar warm gold eyes, and they looked directly at him. 

“Hey,” Bokuto said. 

“Hello,” Akaashi murmured in a faint echo. He wetted his mouth. “Do you—have time to talk?” 

“Sure, Akaashi.” Bokuto brushed over his hair once before released his hands, but the warmth stayed like a fierce burn inside Akaashi. Bokuto sprawled on the floor, hooking his chin on his knee and his hands over his shins. He grinned easily. Akaashi leaned down, pressing his sharp elbows onto his legs. 

“You might not believe me,” he began.

“Of course I’ll believe you.” Bokuto stared up at him, a childish quirk to his mouth. It reminded him of the slight pause after someone asked him how he was doing, the gap between the question and answer, when a genuine want for an honest answer lingered. It was that care, that concern, such a distant concept that Akaashi hid a smile into the folds of his mouth. 

He couldn’t remember how he started, but while he talked, the big and bright wings drew around them. They curved into each other, a crescent diving into a circle, until the tips of the feathers brushed across his shoulders, a comforting and familiar warmth.


End file.
